


The Comforts of Home

by evil_bunny_king



Series: Of the Sun [9]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Abora Lavellan, Christmas Fluff, Dalish Feels, Dancing, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 15:13:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5544725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evil_bunny_king/pseuds/evil_bunny_king
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It had been such a long time since she'd heard these songs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Comforts of Home

The music rolled into the evening, light and stirring, and Dalish elves spun around to its jaunty beat, laughing as they gathered between the campfires. Abora sat outside the Keeper's tent with the other 'guests of honor', watching with a smile as their company steadily peeled away: Keeper Hawen's sisters, the newly fledged hunters, the da'len, clutching each other's hands and giggling in abandon as they spun each other beneath the cover of the trees.

It had been such a long time since she'd heard these songs. The trill of the fiddles. The burr of the drums. She tapped her feet to the beat, humming the familiar chords, and they were different, yes - the songs weaving visions of rolling plains and the sparse forests of the dales - but the energy of it, vibrant and unabashed, it was still - familiar. She breathed the smoke of the campfires and remembered the Lavellan encampment under the boughs of the Planasene. The smell of the roasting hares, lingering beneath the shelter of the aravels and a lightness bubbled up in her chest, bubbled into laughter as she tucked her chin into her palm.

It should surprise her, to feel nostalgic after so many years. But in this moment, with clan and family mustered around, welcoming her as a friend if not one of their own, she felt - like she just might have to dance, later. After some more wine. After the night narrowed to the torch light, and the dancers and the breeze, the moonlight thatching across the grass.

One of the twirling figures peeled away as she watched, staggering the short distance to where she sat, and she raised an eyebrow as Loranil halted before her, arms crossed and pressed against his chest in the formal greeting. Their new comrade in arms was departing with them on the morrow, but tonight he was still carefree, still young, his skin flushed beneath the valaslin, cheeks dimpling with his grin.

"Andaran atishan!" he greeted her, straightening with a little flourish that had him swaying on his feet. She would enjoy their journey tomorrow much more than he would, she suspected. "Not dancing tonight, inquisitor?"

She laughed at his teasing tone; his informality. "Perhaps. I'm afraid I don't remember all the steps, though."

He cracked another grin at that. "Well. There's only one solution to that, isn't there?" And then he was pulling her to her feet, his hands warm in hers, his laughter in her ears.

Caught off guard, she stumbled straight into him, and the two of them took a haphazard step of flailing arms and smothered laughter before she found her feet, her hand still in his. Her head felt heavy with the movement, her veins buzzing with the wine. Perhaps she'd had more than she'd thought.

"What?" she managed at her captor when she'd caught her breath - all too delighted, but he wasn't to know that. "Getting a little familiar with your commanding officer, aren't you?"

"Not at all, lethallan," he quipped back, dragging her to the edge of the firelight, "and besides. I am doing you a service. You will relearn the dances easily enough, I'm sure." Stepping away, he bent into the bow of the opening move - shoulders back, gaze on hers, sparkling, and again she found herself laughing.

"You're drunk," she accused, but she was smiling, irresistibly bright - Lethallan - and when the new song began, she allowed him to spin her into it.

The lights swirled lazily around them. The steps: instinctive and half-remembered, and they drew close and parted as the tune unfolded, her feet finding their way again as if she was once more spinning after her sister while learning not to step on her feet. Too soon the song ended, Loranil releasing her with a bashful smile but she shook her head, reclaiming his hands. The night could roll on without her, she'd decided. Tonight, she could forget and just _be_.

In her brief breaks for breath she saw her companions be slowly cajoled into joining the dance. Dorian, swept away by the fierce head hunter, his slurred objections rolling over the elder woman like water over a stone; Cole, by the children, who tugged at his hat and overly-long sleeves as they towed him along and tried to 'teach' him the steps with giggles and flailing arms.

She laughed at her glimpses of them as the night grew longer. Laughed as the evening burrowed itself beneath her skin, unlooked for and yet welcome, and the full moon rose higher in the sky, edging the dancing figures in silver.

It was when the fourth (or was it the the fifth?) dance came to an end that she finally spotted Solas. He was seated by the campfire, of course, knees drawn to his chest, but there was an animation to his features as he observed the celebrations - a strange expression in his eyes as he watched the camp healer corral the dancers into the next opening position, the fiddlers taking the chance to snag spits of meat from the banked fire.

She wondered after the softness in that look. The warmth in his eyes as he watched Cole be dragged along by yet another gaggle of kids and she remembered with a coil of heat the pleasure of that gaze being directed at her- the slow trail of it, burning where it settled.

She sauntered over, a new idea capturing her thoughts. Perhaps swung her hips a little more than needed, a roll to her step, but she caught his gaze as she drew closer - daring, intent.

"Aneth ara," she greeted him, the light in her chest warm in her voice. He considered her with a slow smile, that strange energy unraveling in his gaze, and she shivered at its focus, the way his voice trickled amused and heavy in the evening air as he greeted her:

"Good evening, vhenan. You've been enjoying yourself."

It was not a question, and her lips turned up at the corners, tickled by the implication. Had he been watching her? "Yes. I have. Do you dance, serah?"

His gaze flitted to the sweat dampened skin of her coquettishly arched neck, flicked back, lingered on her lips. "At times. I do not know these forms, however."

His eyes looked silver, in this light. Darkening like storm clouds as that curl of a smile played across his lips, and she mustered herself with a breath, dipping herself in an elegant invitation. A mimicry of Loranil's bow, her hand extended towards him, before she seized his hands anyway, pulling him to his feet. "It's easy enough, emma lath," she promised, rolling the words on her tongue. She enjoyed his responding chuckle. "All you need do is follow. Will you?"

He raised his brows at her, but stepped after her nonetheless as she moved back to the dancers. "I have thus far. I see no reason to stop now."

She laughed, carefree and happy. "Good."

She towed him to the edge of the clearing, just outside the ring of main dancers. Slid her hand from his, adopted the first pose, and walked him through the simple stages of the dance, laughing as he tripped on the first spin, swallowing that laughter as he executed the second run through perfectly, catching her in her arms.

He leant into her. Kissed her nose, with a cock of a smile that thrilled through her like the warmest of summer days, and something in her seemed to crumble at that; subsided into a contentment she hadn’t felt in over year, subsumed by the chaos of a disintegrating world.

She raised a hand to his cheek and traced her thumb over the freckles that scattered across it. Tipped herself up to capture his lips, giddily, smiling at the traces of spiced wine she found there.

"Thank you," she said as she drew away, and he blinked at her.

"For what in particular?"

She smoothed her thumb to the curve of his cheekbone. Tapped it against his mouth, breath catching when he kissed it _._ “For not stepping on my toes.”

His chuckle rumbled through the two of them and he shook his head slightly. Tried to control the smile that quirked his lips. "Ah. You're welcome. Of course."

The next song began. Quick, joyful, and they took their positions once more: palm to palm, hip to hip, a smile and a warmth beating between their hearts.

The dancers swayed into motion once more, quick and free. They stepped with them.

**Author's Note:**

> MURRY KRISTMAS
> 
> Fluff for once :') and in my canon to boot!
> 
> (I've had so much wine)


End file.
